"Carbon offsets are allowing the world's biggest polluters to forge ahead with business plans that are threatening global climate goals, the head of Greenpeace International said in an interview.

The model allows polluting companies to offset their emissions by buying credits from projects that reduce or avoid the release of climate-warming CO2 elsewhere, such as mass tree plantings or solar power farms - which could be worth $50 billion by 2030 according to a task force created to scale up the market. read more

Environmental advocates such as Greenpeace say this is allowing big emitters like oil majors to put off cutting their own emissions and avoid divesting from hydrocarbons, a primary source of greenhouse gases that cause global warming. read more

"There's no time for offsets. We are in a climate emergency and we need phasing out of fossil fuels," Greenpeace's Executive Director Jennifer Morgan said at the Reuters Impact conference."

Alessandra Prentice reports for Reuters October 6, 2021. [2]